Chapter 31: Ashtaroth

A s we explore the cave system for hours, Lana does not complain. In fact, after asking so many questions, she became silent and I find the absence of her soft voice and dry humor… uncomfortable. Grudgingly, I must admit to myself I no longer prefer solitude and silence where she is concerned. I will simply have to make her desire to give me everything I want, including her willing company.

Deciding not to question the reasons behind these desires, I instead pour that energy into strategizing how to achieve my goals of not only making her amenable to me physically, but also cleaving her to me emotionally. I never entered battle unprepared, after all.

Her mortal stomach growls – interrupting my scheming – and I remove a large piece of cheese I stored in the pouch on my belt. I noticed she does not often voice her desires. A matter of pride, but also not wanting to inconvenience others. I vow to teach her how to demand what she needs.

I extend the food toward her and her round innocent eyes meet mine. With gratitude painted over her transparent expression, she takes the cheese and proceeds to nibble on it.

I withdraw my earlier sentiment – she should always let me think of her needs and allow only me to slake them. The thought of Lana on her knees, while I feed her only the best morsels with my fingers, hardens my cock. She would look up at me in worship and say, ‘Thank you, Master'. And I would reward her for being my good little pet with my hungry mouth between her luscious thighs.

I groan and she snaps her gaze to me. I pretend not to see it and walk faster, trying to outpace the reactions of my body to a mere fantasy. I feel as if I am thousands of years younger and introduced to the pleasures of flesh for the first time.

"Uh, Ashtaroth?"

I cannot recall an instance of her hailing me by my name. The punch of lust I feel at her doing so now is ridiculous. "Yes?" I encourage, when she stays silent.

"I need to… pee." She avoids my gaze, obviously feeling embarrassed by the needs of her body.

"Then go?" I keep my voice monotone, knowing that if I were to take advantage of her awkwardness and tease her now, we would be standing here until tomorrow.

She gapes at me, reminding me of a fish with the way her mouth is opening and closing. "Right here?" She motions to the ground with her hand.

"You may as well. I am not leaving you alone here." I sigh when she just stares at me, eyes wide, and pull her to me by her belt, which I start unbuckling. "You truly believe relieving yourself in front of me will make me lose interest in fucking you?" I click my tongue dismissively. "You won't be free of me so easily." Once her belt is unbuckled, I spin her around and squeeze her behind before nudging her toward an alcove made of stalactite curtains.

She yelps and hisses at me over her shoulder, "You overbearing prick!"

"Prick sounds too small to describe me, don't you think?" I grin at her. "Rod, perhaps? Or baton?" She stares at me in bewilderment, embarrassment pushed aside, so I continue: "A bludgeon? A mace? Oh, I know, a battering ram." Having arrived at the category of siege weapons, I was about to escalate to ‘trebuchet', but she spins around and covers my mouth with her hand. So impudent. If it were anyone else, they would already be a scorch mark on the ground by now. But as it is her, I will just have to punish her with my cock later. The fantasy makes me smile against the palm of her hand and her breath hitches, widening my smile further.

"Don't quit your evil demonic overlord day job to become a stand-up comedian," she quips. "And turn around, will you? This is awkward enough without you watching me."

I grant her this small measure of privacy and turn around. I even take a few steps – enough to appease her but not so far that I could not be by her side in an instant if she screamed. These silly human notions will have to be conditioned out of her, however. I will not allow her to hide anything from me. Once she rejoins me, I hand her the canteen of water which she waves off. "Humans need to drink over two liters of water daily," I chastise.

She takes the offered water with a lifted brow. "Have you been researching human needs?"

"Nonsense. It's common knowledge," I deflect, as my answer would be far too revealing, but she is observing me with a small grin.

"Did you read a book or search the internet?" She is teasing me again and my body feels lighter somehow, like removing plate armor after a long battle.

"What is this internet you speak of?" I frown at her and delight at the aghast expression on her face. "I'm jesting," I add before she has a coronary. The invention of internet pornography has made satiating demons that feed on lust a far easier job than it was before these modern inventions propagated sex so prolifically.

"Asshole," she mutters. Since it makes her eyes gleam, I don't punish her for it.

Mood lighter, we continue our venture into the cave's depths. When we arrive at forks, we choose a direction at random. After eating a few apples and some dried meat, she scowls into the darkness. There are no lava vents in this narrower tunnel and I summon fire to hover over her shoulder – I can see as well in the dark as I do on a bright summer day. Not that I witnessed one personally in a few millennia. Being banished from the sun by the Almighty has that consequence.

"There has to be a simpler way to get to wherever we're going," she grumbles.

"Well, we could manifest through the ether, but it would be slow going in a closed space. We would have to make hundreds of stops." I know what her reply will be before she utters it, but I laugh at the sheer flair of her insults. I catch ‘insensitive oaf' and ‘diabolical sadist' in the barrage of barbs.

We run into another pair of souls given physical form, as incorporeal as that form may be. I allow her to dispatch them once more – I am nothing if not a magnanimous creature.

"That's the second pair in these caves, as far as we know of at least. Why are they gathering like this?" she asks.

"I do not know. While I hold a vote on the Council, I admit to not giving this issue much thought. Most of my brethren did not. It was at Belial's insistence that we came to a consensus over the matter of bringing your kind here."

"You're on the Council? Did you want us to come here?" She sounds impressed, though I always found it a tedious position.

"Yes," I sigh. "Heaven believes that an exodus from Hell due to overcrowding would lead to Armageddon on Earth. While our side may find the chaos of the process enjoyable, those of us in command know that the extermination of the human species would staunch the flow of sinful energy coming from Above. Demonkind would be forced to feed off each other. Most would eventually starve."

"Yikes. Speaking of overcrowding…" She ducks into a narrow passage and I wait until she is nearly at the other side before I materialize there. "Show-off," she grouses. "But, overcrowding, can you explain that to me? Because the majority of human souls don't become demons, right, just incorporeal? And while we dispatch manifestations daily, and I see a minor demon or two almost as often, it doesn't feel that cramped here, you know?"

I turn and she stops before she would have crashed into me. "You know how the manifestations come to be, correct?"

She frowns up at me, either because of my sudden stop, or because she believes I'm questioning her intelligence. "Yes, of course. Several human souls that have been sent to Hell have to be occupying the same space to become dense enough to evolve into the ghostly blobs we see." She comes to the realization and her mouth forms a tempting little oval. "Oh."

"Yes, oh . If you saw what I see, you would be hesitant to stroll around so casually." Point made, I turn and start walking again, but not before I see her shudder.

"You see every soul? How bad is it?" She catches up to me, her beautiful spring-green eyes wider than usual.

This time I frown. "Not so bad that there should be two or more manifestations so closely together. But while Heaven is perpetually expanding, accommodating the ever-increasing influx of souls, Hell is static. Frozen just as Father made it eons ago."

"That part I know." She nods. "Why isn't Hell expanding, though? It's like building a prison and just adding more and more inmates, not changing the size or number of guards."

"Mm. That is a fitting metaphor. But I do not presume to know Father's plans…" My voice trails off as I sense something – someone – ahead. The infernal opening to the Pits under my brother's house indicated that he is in the heart of Hell, but could we have been wrong?

"You still call him Father," Lana muses. "After all this time, after everything?"

"I do not hate Him," I reply absentmindedly. "Not like some of my brethren."

My curious pet would probably have dug deeper with her endless questions (and I would have indulged them because she clearly has me by the balls), but she stops and straightens in alarm instead. "There's a demon ahead. Judging by the similarity of your power outputs, I would wager a week of Abaddon's kitchen duty that it's an archdemon."

Her senses are as sharp as the Fallen claimed. "How loud of a temper tantrum would you throw if I asked you to stay here?"

"Like releasing Puck in a china shop," she replies, her voice singsong. Fine. I would hesitate to leave her unguarded regardless. She is safest with me.

Another twenty minutes and we reach a cavern with a high ceiling, an underground stream steaming from subterranean lava flows gurgling on the far side. There is furniture, though nothing would make the cavern appealing to a woman used to human comforts – which is what Asmodai attempted, judging by the less Spartan additions of pillows heaped on the bed, bookshelves full of colorful volumes, and a plush seating area.

I determined the identity of the archdemon standing before that bed, back turned to us, before we entered. And it is not my brother.